February 25, 2013

The Red Cross Blood Center in Nara Prefecture joined forces with virtual idol Hatsune Miku in a campaign to encourage young people to donate blood last week. As part of the campaign at the Aeon Mall Kashihara, donors received an original Hatsune Miku poster ("Your courage means another life") and a postcard:

This is not the first time Hatsune Miku did her part for blood donations. For years, a blood donor center called akiba:F in Tokyo's Akihabara shopping district has recruited potential donors through stickers and other tie-ins to Hatsune Miku, Evangelion, and similar popular franchises.

Samsung Electronics will unveil its next flagship smartphone, the Galaxy S4, on March 14, CNET has confirmed.

Samsung is set to send out invitations this morning to a "Samsung Unpacked" event in New York for next month, CNET has learned. While the invitation contained little details, CNET has confirmed with a high-level executive that the Galaxy S4 will make its debut there.

After the blockbuster success of the Galaxy S3, anticipation has surged for the successor to the Galaxy S franchise. The Galaxy S3 last year emerged as a true rival to Apple's iPhone, even seeing accelerating sales after the iPhone 5 launched late last year.

Indeed, Samsung's tease will likely overshadow many of the other announcements at Mobile World Congress, which like the Consumer Electronics Show has seen its relevance diminish as the major players opt for their own announcements. HTC last week debuted its flagship One smartphone at its own global event in London and New York.

Earlier reports pegged the launch to occur on March 14, and there have been loads of specifications that are rumored to be included.

Among them is a rumored eight-core Exynos processor, a separate eight-core graphics processing unit, a 4.99-inch SuperAmoled display, 2GB of RAM, a 13-megapixel rear camera with 1080p video capability, a 2-megapixel front-facing camera, and the latest version of Android, known as 4.2.2 Jelly Bean.

Samsung told CNET that it is also considering embedding its new security software, Knox, into the Galaxy S4.